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Monthly Archives: March 2011

How many awakenings will one experience in their lifetime? Growing up I just assumed that everyone only had maybe 1 or 2 in their life but that’s out the window now because I have had 2 major awakenings in the last 3 years so I imagine that the average self aware adult has the potential to have at least a dozen different eye-opening experiences in the span of their life.

The first awakening I can remember was about 6 months after my closest friend passed away unexpectedly. After he died I went into auto-pilot. I truthfully have no idea how I completed tasks at my corporate home-office job or around the house for those 6 months.

Anyway- I distinctly remember sitting at my desk one morning at work and it was as if someone had removed a veil from my eyes. I looked around. Looked down at my desk and realized I HATED MY JOB. LOATHED IT. I am sure that I would have quit earlier had I not been mourning my friend those 6 months. I was promoting a travel company then on the side and shortly after that day I resigned to pursue the travel referral business full time. This travel company later morphed into what caused my second awakening.

The second major awakening happened just recently and is still in the process of happening. I started promoting a web-based shopping rewards company in 2009 and due to the bad press that one blogger who specialized in SEO started it crashed and burned right after launch. I fought every day to publish positive content on 2 self-funded blogs about the company, and endured just about every other hardship you can imagine. I, along with about 30 others who were just as dedicated as I was really shouldered a heavy burden that included the loss of friends and loss of credibility.

I only just recently started realizing that this ship may be unable to continue sailing. I could be wrong. It may have an awesome comeback, and I hope it does. This is beside the point. The awakening was this: I sold out. I sold out to a company (that I honestly believed in) when you’re really only supposed to sell out to your team and yourself in this industry.

Companies come and go. Trends change but teams- if successful teams stick together then they will make money in any company!

In this awakening I have a mixture of feelings- heightened maturity as I look back but also some slight embarrassment and disbelief that I really acted that young and naive at ages 23-26. While I really WAS young and fairly naive I still thought that I would find my niche just by throwing myself into it because that’s how I achieved other things before.

I knew nothing about business, business relationships, or the network marketing industry and I never recommend approaching a business by totally immersing yourself blindly. That was a bad idea so I hope you learn from my mistakes!

While I have learned a LOT I also failed at A LOT. I will try to take that experience and move forward because you can only get really GOOD at something after you’ve sucked at it.

Remember- it is about the team. It is about sticking together. It is about making mistakes and learning from them.

This is one of the rare times when I write about something OTHER than business but I just felt compelled to share this with you all because I believe love relationships are so important to our every day lives. Want to enhance your relationship and strengthen how you communicate? Read on!

My husband and I have known each other for 13 years this year and have been married for over 6 and if you ask us the key to a strong, happy marriage is definitely communication. Without communication the trials of marriage and adulthood can become too much to bear and then that precious relationship can easily begin to break down under those stresses. When people stop talking about their feelings and their needs the relationship is bound to become strained. I have seen this time and time again, especially with younger couples.

One exercise my husband and I like to practice that enhances our communication is riding motorcycles 2 up. (meaning a driver in the front and a rider in the back)

Riding 2 up together on a bike effectively results in the rider being nearly perfectly in tune with the driver, especially when 2-way helmet intercoms are not used. and nothing says intimacy more to me than going 80 miles an hour on a motorcycle and trusting your driver with both your lives.

As a rider you learn to know what your driver’s body language means. Common non-verbal communication is needed to know when the driver is experiencing confidence or sports a dangerous situation ahead, when you need to duck down during acceleration or high winds, how to signal that you need to pull over, and even how to express joy or discomfort while riding.

Though I am writing from the rider’s perspective my observations are that, as a driver, you learn how to confidently handle the bike, the road, and the surrounding driving environment which makes your rider feel at ease, making the ride enjoyable for you both.

Being in tune with one another in this way is a feeling that I can not describe with mere words. It is something you have to experience yourself, only then will you understand. Once you have experienced it you will never forget the sensation. I can only liken it to some kind of cosmic connection- it just “clicks” when you’re riding with someone you trust and love.

How do you apply this to your life? Well, if you know how to drive a motorcycle or think you can learn then I highly recommend that you and your spouse or partner invest in a comfortable, more upright positioned bike and ride it together often because riding has greatly enhanced our marriage and the ways in which we communicate and know one another on a day to day basis.

If you apply this advice please let me know its effects on your relationship!

Here are some more tips on team building based on my own wins and losses since September 2007. They are in no particular order (except for the first one!) They are all important and I hope you can learn from my mistakes!

MOST IMPORTANT. As soon as someone enrolls work on getting them their required customers to trigger the fast start bonus.

Avoid focus on their domain name (if they choose to buy one), their dream board, etc. until they’ve got their customers!!!!!

Get them their customers. THEN roll up your sleeves and help them with the dream board, the strategy, the domain name, the sizzle cards, the business cards, etc.

Consider making a new rep’s sizzle cards for them or get together and make and cut the cards together so they learn how but NEVER keep supplying them with cards because that does nothing for their growth. It keeps them infants in their business. Show them once then put the rest in their hands.

Do just a few one-on-one presentations for your teammate’s leads and have them be a positive “back up” to the points you make in the presentation. Then switch roles from then on. Requiring them to do their own presentations fosters growth and builds their confidence which also builds leaders.

So to be company-specific here’s the general guidelines to helping a new Ampegy independent representative get started:

1. First-help the new Representative get their required customers to trigger the fast start bonus

2. Get them to make a list of potential customers and reps

3. Make sure they have accessed their back office, set up their direct deposit, etc.

4. Help them with a dream board or dream list of some kind

5. Make sure they know the webinar/call times. Remind them the first 2 weeks- (tell them you’ll remind them just the first 2 weeks)

Got any team building tips you’ve learned along the way? Please share them by leaving a comment!

This is just going to be a collection of things I have learned to AVOID doing in my almost 4 years of being in the Network Marketing industry.

1. No matter how excited you are NEVER get something permanent to reflect your business because anything can change at ANY TIME. This includes vanity license plates, jewelry (unless given to you by the company), permanent signage, tattoos, car paint jobs, etc.

This is something that I both observed when spending time with Mike and Barb Lammons out in California AND have personal experience with. For instance, I got so excited about a company that I bought the license plate for the state of Arkansas.

The reason why this was a bad decision was because the company is just the vehicle. The industry is the stuff that makes the vehicle drive… YOU are the fuel. Brand yourself. Brand your team. NEVER tie yourself to a company in that way.

Now promote your heart out always in whatever company you choose..but never lose your identity along the way. Believe me it is easy to do. You get so caught up in the company and its success that you forget about you and the health of your team.

2. Never try to do it all. Ask your team to share some of the responsibility. Nobody can shoulder all the responsibility all the time.

4. Never EVER buy someone in to your company. No matter HOW perfect you think that prospect will be for your team buying them in is NEVER a good idea because they have risked nothing therefore they can quit without losing any money.

If you buy someone in you’re basically asking them to quit on you. I also say this from experience. I have helped at least 10 people join my company and they are ALL GONE. None of them stayed.

5. Only go where the money is. Now-let me explain. If someone you know or meet says “hey, can you fly/drive out to X. I want to talk to you about the business.” Say, sure. Let’s talk on the phone first. If you still want me to come out enroll as a Representative and get me 3 other people to talk to while I’m there and I’ll come.

I have wasted SO MUCH TIME, MONEY, and EMOTIONAL ENERGY on people who asked me to come out to places as far out as Seattle ( I live in Arkansas) with NO intention of talking about the business. They just wanted to see me, catch up, or wanted to ask for money. This happened to me because I thought that, as a leader, I should go and because of this I wasted my time, money, and energy. I hope you learn from my mistakes.

If you apply these 5 things to avoid to your business I believe that you’ll notice a big change. My hope is that this helps at least one person grow and become more successful.

Have you made a mistake that I left out? Please comment and share it so we can all learn from it together!